Homecoming
by Dalukes
Summary: After five years, Red finally makes his way back to the place where his long journey began. BurningLeafShipping (Red x Leaf/Blue), backstory heavy.


Date Started: 7/2/2016

Date Completed: 9/12/2016

Date Edited: 7/5/2017

Date Published: 8/17/2017

* * *

Days like this were rare in Kanto. The afternoon's glow was completely unaffected by clouds as the day slowly etched away for night. The tree's branches sat still, unmoving, with a lack of Pokémon or wind. It had been a while since he'd been anywhere this calm—but he was definitely used to the cold, lasting silence by now. In a way, it was almost like he'd wanted to stay on the top of Death Mountain (as the locals called it). He'd never viewed anything other than his own Pokémon training with enough importance to describe it a need.

But now, as 18-year-old Red stepped off of the dirt roads that extended out of the small farm town and into Pallet for what must have been the first time in years, he felt like it was needed. Required, almost.

The walk was good. He liked walking. He'd ran a lot as a young man, especially on his journey. He hardly used his bike he got from the nice chairman at the Pokémon Fan Club. He felt a little bit bad and guilty about that. He needed to walk, anyway. The Indigo League would be looking for him to fly off the mountain if he were to leave.

His quandary resurfaced. He'd pondered for hours on his trek from off the mountain back down towards Kanto and, in bigger schemes, Pallet Town, about what he'd actually do once he set foot back in the town. Of course, seeing his mother was a given. That woman was probably worried sick despite sending letters up the mountain to Red every week. She got a little over half back compared to what she sent.

Red didn't like being called a mama's boy. Probably because he knew it was accurate.

Sighing, he set off in that direction. It'd be one of the only places he'd be welcomed back with open arms, after all. He wasn't sure how the town would take their resident champion after he not only didn't come home during that five or six year span, but he lost his title.

To a twelve year old boy.

Named Ethan Gold.

The dewy southern Kanto grass dampened Red's black joggers and the bottoms of his dark denim jeans, forcing his socks to cling uncomfortably to his ankles and feet. He'd felt that feeling a lot lately, especially living on a place where you basically had to go out every morning and mow the snow that piled up instead of the growing grass, like sand in an hourglass biding time until he eventually left. His feet often froze together with sweat, and he'd have to have Charizard literally burn the frozen ice off of his feet. Sometimes, the skin would freeze and die, still on his feet, so he'd have Pikachu zap it off just so his feet wouldn't get hypothermia and have to be amputated.

It wasn't fun living on Mount Silver.

The Main Street that ran through center town was now renamed to Oak Street. Whether or not it honored the celebrated professor of the area and Red's neighbor or his grandson, Red's rival, Red didn't care enough to learn.

Blue probably paid for it anyway.

To his honest surprise, everything else was just as he seemingly left it five years ago. The ice cream shop he frequented before leaving on his journey still belonged to and was managed by Miss Jodi, as it seemed from the front. It hadn't changed at all. The department store across the street that Leaf flirted with guys at was the same apart from a new grey paint job. Daisy's flower shop at the corner of Oak and Poppy Street was the same, though he knew about that from Blue's crude attempts at writing letters.

Blue. He had to chuckle, a sound he hadn't heard in a while. That guy apparently made a gym leading position in Viridian. He'd come a long way from the hotheaded, loudmouthed narcissist that used to be Red's rival.

Red and Blue used to be a sort of friend one only saw in books. The two went everywhere together: the forests, the ice cream shop (Jodi always gave them a hard time), and oftentimes through the farm fields and miltank pastures towards the vast expanse of ocean south of town. Blue always had an urge to be an adventurer, and by subsequent consequence, so did Red.

Blue had always been the prodigy; the celebrated one; the number one on the list. Heck, they'd brought in a magazine at some point to interview him. There had been a test given to each young trainer wishing to leave on a journey before they were allowed access to their starter pokémon. Blue had aced the test, earning the only 100% in trainer history. He completely overshadowed Red's 96%, and demolished Leaf's 78%.

Leaf.

Red had been sitting in his tent on the east side of the mountain, pondering his training, when he heard from her last. There was still no answer as to why he himself kept training long after he started his training alone. He really did feel cold as snow under his feet, empty as the caves dotting the mountainside, and hardened as the stray Tyranitar that occasionally walked through his camp. As he was (for lack of a better word) sulking, his Johtan pokégear began to ring. It was set on a rock outside, hardly used aside to tell time and date because of the rarity of a call and lack of service. To say he was surprised would be an understatement. He almost took the tent down in a fit.

He was even more surprised to see it was Leaf on the other side of the phone. A small smile grew on his face. The last time he'd seen her, he was leaving Pallet Town by way of Charizard in the early morning.

The way Red saw it, the Pokémon League was scared. Scared of what, it was beyond him. Probably scared of both him and Blue, when he thought about it. The two of them had torn through league members with hardly a scratch, only proving a worthy match for each other in the battle to decide the champion. In the end, Red won, and he was forced to retire to Mount Silver until he was defeated. Red never knew why he had to go. Blue got there first; why wasn't he going as well?

Red never got his answer. He'd learned not to expect one in the first place. He was herded off, restricting access to family and friends through means of pokémon-assisted mail. He was not to leave the mountain until he was defeated. He knew once that phone call came in, he was on the clock. They were coming to find him. With what punishment, he didn't know.

Leaf spoke quickly, her voice in babbles and unintelligible. She had a hook in her voice that meant only one thing: she was scared. "I don't have much time, honey, so I can't say hi or talk about how life is. I need you to listen and listen to me well."

Red's face, unbeknownst to him, flushed his namesake at her childhood nickname for him. He tried to ask her what was going on, but all that came out was rasps of air. He hadn't spoken a word in too long.

"Blue got a challenger last week. His name was Ethan. He said his goal was to beat you, and then he'd quit his journey. Said he was doing it for money or the mafia or something like that. He took on Blue and beat him. Soundly. Swept the whole team with his Typhlosion. He's coming, Red, and he's your trip home."

Red tried hard to speak. Nothing but void exited, taking the place of his words. He hadn't spoken in years, and it was showing. Tears formed in his eyes, stinging cold skin.

"Red, I need you to lose to Ethan. Please." She pleaded with him, her voice soft and full of tears.

"We all need you home. Please. I don't care if you throw the fight; none of us do. All the league will see is a loss and they'll let you come home. To your mom. To professor Oak, to Blue, to me."

Then the call hung up, suddenly and without warning. She knew the league was coming. The timer was running down. He'd been up there for years. Dammit, he was getting cold.

It was done. He was going home. Ethan never suspected a thing.

His pokémon weren't too keen on the thought, but Red didn't need that much time or words to persuade them. Blastoise, especially. He straight up danced around until the opponent showed up.

Right as the match with Ethan began, it was over. Pikachu paralyzed himself, Lapras froze itself, Snorlax stayed asleep, Charizard didn't fly, Venusaur poisoned herself, and Blastoise used withdraw and didn't come out. Needless to say, it took a long time to get Red down.

Once the oblivious (and probably not too smart) Ethan skipped off with a handful of cash, Red let a pent-up smile go. He gathered up his things, polluting the mountain by leaving a few camping tools behind and the fire still going as a middle finger to the vicious and villainous icy environment around him, and walked down the same path he walked up years ago. This time, he wasn't learning how to lose his voice, but use it.

* * *

He stopped reminiscing long enough to spot his home across the street. The little white bungalow hadn't changed a bit. The tomato garden his mother pored over every morning was as robust and plentiful as it had been when he left. The far right green shutter on the front was still tilted a bit too far, much to his mother's annoyance (however, she wasn't proactive enough to change it herself). Sitting on the welcome mat sat their faithful family pet, a rather lazy and engorged meowth named Baxter. He was an old cat, but he wasn't too far gone enough to not remember who Red was.

The cat let out a squeal of glee, pawing at the front door and mewing incessantly. Red grinned. Baxter was one odd cat, alright. He hadn't changed a bit.

"Baxter? What is it?" A woman's cry emanated from the inside with a bang of pots and pans. Red chuckled silently, knowing she was probably in the middle of making dinner for herself and the spoilt cat. The door swung open, and a middle-aged woman exited, leaning down to pick up the cat. Her previously raven-black hair had strings of silver interlaced amongst its strands. She wore an aged maroon blouse and apron.

She raised up the cat, not giving a look towards who was standing ten feet in front of her. "Come on, Baxter, you can't keep doing... that..."

Her eyes caught a hold of her son for the first time in years. Red offered up a small, awkward smile and a short little wave.

Mrs. Ketchum dropped the cat.

"Oh, my baby, oh, you're home!" She sprung, squeezing the young man in a ready hug. "Oh, I've missed you so, so much."

He offered a few embarrassed pats back, grinning awkwardly.

She took a step back, taking in the view of her older son while still grasping his shoulders. "You've gotten so big, honey. You're looking more and more like your father. I only wish he were here."

She ran a hand through her hair. "Um, Blue came through a while ago, said you might be coming today. You can tell me all about that later, I know your voice is probably rusty as a century-old tractor."

Red sat confused. How women were able to know everything at one single moment from a variety of sources, he had no idea. He could blame it on mother's intuition or gossip, but that would be one more example in his long list.

She beckoned him towards the house. "C'mon in, hun, I got spaghetti for you."

Red had almost forgotten how much he loved spaghetti. His stomach hadn't.

* * *

Red grew up in Pallet Town. His parents were from different parts of Kanto, though. His dad was a young man from Cerulean City with a chip on his shoulder and his mother was a home-grown modest woman from Fuchsia, down south. They had met in 1988, Red's mother often drew on, and knew immediately they were perfect for each other.

Blue's family was native to Pallet. Blue was born two days before Red in 1994, causing the first of many reasons to say Blue had been the first to do everything before Red.

Their friendship was toxic to say the least. Blue was Red's only friend for ten years, from day one. Then, once Blue started to get a head on his shoulders, his modest childhood activities morphed into the superstar all-about-me mentality he had for a while. He and Red used to romp around and play like all the other children, albeit on their own. Once Pokémon school started, Blue became the big headed jerk he always was on the inside.

He pushed the oft-mute Red out of the way, oftentimes teasing him in front of kids Blue called "friends" and Red called his first curse words.

That proved to be the ultimate motivator for Red.

Blue may have gotten there first, yes, just like how all the predictions and magazines said. But what the experts missed was the fact that Red got there second—but better. He trained longer, and never lost a battle. He flew under the radar.

To all but one.

At some point when he was 12, a year before he left on his journey, Red met the troublemaker Delia "Leaf" Greene. Leaf was older than he was, 14 at the time, but really might as well have been the best friend Red ever had. A bit of a minor criminal, yeah, but she always made up for it. She may have teased him a bit more than Blue, but she never went too far and never demoralized him. She was his biggest fan, traveling with him (more or less) for his entire journey. When she quit, she went with him everywhere.

She was a talker, eh? She was really the whole reason why he was off the mountain instead of still training for no reason. She had, surprisingly and uncharacteristically, been the voice of reason and talked him into leaving.

Normally, she was nothing but trouble. The problem child of the big three of Pallet Town, Leaf Greene made sure to leave her track record of broken hearted guys, stolen food, and defeated Pokémon Trainers a country mile wide. Red was almost always the one who had to clean up after her, wearing an apologetic face. Blue was all for the party, as long as he wasn't associated come cleanup. She'd quit halfway through her journey, before the league could catch a hold of her rule breaking and suspend her. In her words, "I'd rather quit while I'm ahead than get shut down by the fuzz."

During Red and Leaf's first meeting after they were set loose on their journey, they talked for a bit on strategies. The next, on route 8, they met again, this time resting by a rock under a tree while the summer sun blazed above them. The next, they spoke about how overrated potions were, and then Pokémon centers with the next meeting, and so on and so on.

One of Red's specific memories he enjoyed with Leaf occurred at Vermillion City. He was struggling to find strategies to defeat Lieutenant Surge with only a Squirtle, a Pikachu, and a Pidgeotto on his competitive team. She had seen him down in the dumps and became serious, dragging him to the docks and forcing him to relax a bit. She'd rubbed down his shoulders, and it felt so good he tried the same thing on the S.S. Anne's captain when the old man got seasick. Apparently, Leaf's family was made up of a lot of masseuses.

They also met during an overnight stay in Saffron City as he attempted to face the gym leader, Erika. Leaf was hungry, with obviously no money since she'd lost three times to Erika with a charizard somehow. Red graciously disallowed her from stealing and gave her a couple hundred dollars. Feeling even more courteous, he took her out to dinner at a restaurant she enjoyed that day. When she called it a 'date' afterward, his blushing face told the entirety of his story while her beautiful laughing face told all of hers.

It was already nightfall by the time they were done eating, so they both needed somewhere to stay for the night.

"Let's stay at the hotel." Red had brought up, pointing towards the only hotel in the entire city. For a large town, it definitely had an overnight-stay deficiency. The nightlife was too bustling and loud for the two young adults, so they jettisoned for the hotel immediately.

Red had walked up to the counter, ready to rent a room. When he had, Leaf had gone with him up the stairs, as if she thought she was staying with him. Red didn't have the heart to deny her that simple service—she probably wanted to use the money for something else, anyway. Though this room only had one bed.

It wasn't that Red wasn't attracted to her—he was a healthy young man, after all—but the problem was, in fact, the opposite. As she exited the shower, he caught a hold of her for really the first time. He especially noted the spattering of freckles that dotted her face, as well as her beautiful emerald eyes that shone when they escaped from her eyelids slammed shut from the laughter. Her perfect teeth were also on display, accentuating the bouts of giggling laughter that were the most musical sound Red had ever experienced.

Of course, she was laughing at his flattered face as she purposely lost a handle on her towel. Red didn't get much sleep that night.

Then she beat the gym the next day and left, leaving Red feeling a little different on the subject of girls than he had before.

He hated sharing Pokémon Center rooms. He got a lot of stares. She loved them.

She had a bold side not many people but him saw. She was teasing and joking and sexy all rolled into one dangerous package that he couldn't handle at some points. He was pretty sure she'd done just about everything—and he meant everything. She'd been his first kiss, after all, but that was only after she'd downed a few tall drinks they both weren't old enough for and she clung to him the rest of the night. She tasted like alcohol, and it stung like hell, but there was a bit of a hidden taste that he swore he got addicted to. Even if that was the only time he'd ever kissed a girl. Even intoxicated, she was a damn good kisser. Not that he'd had much experience.

It wasn't long until he realized that she only exposed that side to him, and it wasn't longer until he realized that he probably was so far in love with her that the week they normally spent apart during their traveling days felt like months.

Despite sharing rooms all the time, she hadn't kissed him since.

* * *

Red sat on the old recliner in the far corner of the living room, staring at his calloused hands intently. One at first may think Red a quiet, mute idiot. The truth was quite the opposite, actually. Red was quiet because he thought, and he thought a lot. His base intelligence soared over everyone else's in the Pallet Town class, with an IQ of 164 and a PokéQuiz score of 94%.

His thoughts centered themselves around Leaf again. Last time he'd seen her, he'd been flying away from her for the "last time". He made sure to promise that. He didn't remember much of the other pieces of that conversation, but he did notice that Leaf seemed a bit colder and distant in those final minutes before he left.

She had seemed so hesitant and closed off before he flew off, but in her phone call before he fought Ethan, she had seemed close to tears and pleading for him to come home. Red was a thinker. The more he set this scenario up in his head, the more it didn't make sense. The last time he saw her she was pissed, and now she's begging for his return? Girls didn't work that way. He knew.

A knock. One, loud and commanding. His mother scurried to the door to protect the visitor from an angered Baxter. Red couldn't tell who it was from their conversation at the door, but he knew it was a man he knew well. Years on a mountaintop killed any chance of him growing into adulthood with his friends.

The door shut, and heavy, apprehensive footsteps emanated throughout the hallway. They stopped directly behind him. "Red?"

Their voice had cracked. Red smiled. He knew all too well who this was.

He stood and took his first look at Blue Oak in years.

Blue wasn't as tall now. Red was almost his height, not counting his ball cap. Blue had lorded his height over Red every day of his life. Ironic Red ended up thousands of feet higher than Blue in the long run.

His hair was now more wild and open than it used to. The young man used to be especially ashamed of how his hair would fray out and be generally uncontrollable, but he had apparently learned to embrace the annoyance. Red learned to embrace his forest of hair a long time ago, taming it with a single ballcap.

Blue wore a black t-shirt similar to Red's, but his jeans were a commanding tone of white. Red didn't have the heart to jokingly tell the homophobe it looked gay. The lanyard he hooked his keys onto hung out of his pocket.

Blue fought back tears, it looked like. "Don't just stand there."

Red was crushed in a hug as Blue seemed to let it all out. Just like Blue. Never shutting up. "You never answered. After about a year the campfire smoke we saw every day disappeared, and most of us knew you just moved camps but some thought... I mean, I took the final gym because I wanted to make sure they'd take you down. Every day we thought you'd died, man. Don't pull stupid shit like that again, alright? I'll give you a rumble if you do."

Red did all he could do in hug his ex-friend/ex-enemy back. Blue must not have known that the league forced Red up to the mountaintop. He must not have had many conversations with Leaf, then.

Knowing his question might not be answered the way he wanted it to, Red asked it anyway. His unused voice barely managed to croak out the words. "How's Leaf? Is she okay?"

Blue's face fell, and he turned to Red's mother. "I haven't heard from her in days. Last I knew she was trying to figure out how to break through the coverage wall the league put on that mountain. She didn't sleep, man. She was determined."

Red nodded, staring at his shoes. None of this made any sense. If Leaf was anybody but a trickster, she was dead-set on a thought and wouldn't change her mind no matter what decided to unwisely step in her way. That and maybe a bit of a siren, according to more than one angered and broken-hearted guy that night in Celadon.

Red rose his head after a thought entered his mind. He gave Blue a determined look Blue had only seen when Red was about to beat him. His dark brown hair covered a bit of his eyes, but the brown orbs stayed focused and sharp. The side of his mouth curled down into a slight determined frown.

"Where is she now?"

* * *

The ocean was a loud, busy place. Cacophonies of the gulls, crashing waves, and the percussive sounds of krabby cries often made it a disastrous mess of a place most in Pallet tended to stay away from. If not for the rocks at the bottom of the docks, then for the strong currents and riptides that took the lives of few, but struck fear into the hearts of many. Today, those rocks and waves that were so villainous and ominous before were calmed, almost as if their visitor had willed them to be that way through her own mind and they were just courteous enough to stop being rambunctious while she thought.

The wooden railing of the town's ocean overlook was old and softened, perhaps by the salty sea air and spray that peppered it every conscious moment. The farmtown often said that the most unpleasant thing about itself was its' smell. Salty and bitter.

Leaf Greene rather enjoyed the ocean.

She tapped her dainty fingers against the railing, in tandem with the voice of the waves and ocean to create natural music. Leaf never thought herself a musical person, but truth be told she wasn't far from it. Oh, the stories she could tell of serenading passers-by during her journey with Red and watching the younger boy squirm as she flirted with them.

In a way, it was her form of entertainment to tease him. He'd always loved her, she knew, he just didn't know how to put it to words. He was a bit like that, and most people didn't understand. They called him quiet and reserved, sometimes even dumb for his lack of words. Leaf knew how he really was, though. He was calm, kind, and thoughtful, choosing his words carefully. That's why he took time sometimes. Words and conversation were very important to him, and he couldn't afford to mess them up by overusing them or using them wrong.

And so Leaf oftentimes spoke for him, much to his apparent displeasure.

The setting sun dipped below the ocean once more. Leaf's face was illuminated by the brilliant oranges and purples that painted an otherwise boring sky. Her hazel eyes hooked themselves on the sunset. Visitors to the Kanto region would often say that the region had the best sunsets the world had to offer. If one were to get competitive, they would say Pallet had the best spot to view them.

The last time Leaf had watched a sunset like this, she was doing the same thing: waiting for Red. Except the last time, she was waiting to say goodbye, and this time, she was waiting to say hello.

She had no idea how it would go down.

For being a quiet, introverted boy, Red wore his heart on his sleeve for most of his life. It was easy to tell who he loved and how much he loved them. Where his words didn't evolve much, his expressions did with leaps and bounds. Leaf was more secretive. She hid things from everybody. Of course, that came with the territory of growing up a thief. But after she was more-or-less adopted by the Greene family, her criminal ways significantly dipped off and she became more of an emotional string-puller. A puppeteer toward her own will. And she wasn't above using her brilliant looks on unsuspecting younger guys.

Her mother—that is, her biological mother, and her caretaker for the first half of her life—had often told her that love was a lie. The romanticized version, at least. The whole "soulmate" and "forever" thing was a bunch of bullcrap and that a chemical reaction drove most people. She never knew her biological father. And so Leaf grew up to be a professional heartbreaker.

The two's views differed so greatly it was easy to see how they meshed. Just when they left each other did they actually see the tearing and the scars they left behind from the initial collision.

Red would probably be mad at her. Victory was the only thing on his mind, and even the prospect of giving up and letting go made him irritated at times. She knew that from firsthand experience. When she told him to give up and leave, she didn't give him much of a choice. The league heard her call, and that call selfishly forced him down. Even if he did beat Ethan, he'd be in trouble. Deep trouble.

It was hard to tell herself she wasn't being selfish.

* * *

It didn't take Red long to find her. There was only one dock in the town, after all.

She was turned away from him, bent over the rail, the last few minutes of fading daylight adding a nonexistent halo around her. He thought it ironic, but oddly applicable. She hardly looked more graceful and beautiful, he thought, then when she was quiet. Thinking. Angelic.

She was wearing a jacket, not powder blue like she normally wore but a darker shade of faded yellow, almost like an aviator's jacket. Her white planter's hat graced her honey brunette hair that cascaded down her slim back and rested just above her denim jeans. She never wore jeans.

He was maybe twenty feet from her. The waves weren't loud, like normal, but they weren't quiet, either. Red had always hated the annoyance of the ocean waves. It kept him up at night multiple times in his childhood.

He coughed once, but it didn't get her attention. He'd have to use his voice. The thought murdered him silently. Typical he had to use his words around her.

He tried once. "L-leaf." It was a pitiful little croak, easily drowned out by the crashing waves. The slightest pidgey chirp could have drowned that out.

But she was listening.

Her head jerked up, ears probably pricked for just that still, small voice. Slowly, she turned, as if scared of what she would see behind her. For the second time that day, he offered a short little wave. He mentally slapped himself for his social awkwardness, but that wasn't exactly his fault.

She tentatively took a step forward, analyzing him, scrutinizing his jeans, his black shirt, his red hat and jacket he always wore to everything he breathed at, and his face. When everything passed, that crooked smile that hooked in so many before Red broke the surface.

She started running. Just a few bounds it took for her to get to him, but it felt to her like a long time. She didn't know when her feelings for this guy started. Normally stuff like that she could just push to the side, but this guy apparently had other plans.

She'd say it started just after he left on that charizard. That would be when she realized she missed him more because of the hole he fit in her life and less because there'd be no one to tease and insinuate dirty things to.

She stopped, inches in front of him. She offered an awkward smile, and he gave her another one. The reconnection was a far cry from the spinning embrace she had long since dreamed about, but she quelled the displeasure and settled for the notion that this would do just fine.

Then, her eyes sharpened. She reared back and smacked him in the face, burning the woolen beard he had just managed to grow.

"Redwood Ketchum! You know how long it's been since I heard a single damn thing from you?" Her soft, stern southern twang scalded and graced his ears at the same time.

He rubbed his face gingerly. "I'm sorry, Leaf." How could these be the first words he heard from her in so many years?

She mellowed, smile breaking through again as her hazel orbs showcased mercy. Here he was, the man of the hour, and she smacked him. She didn't really know why she did it. She knew it wasn't his fault. Though his lack of letters addressed to her did hurt a bit. That's what she settled on as the reason.

"You came back."

It was a statement, laced with a break in her voice that nearly broke the man the words were intended for. He chuckled, taking a step closer with his hands in his jeans. "Yeah. I did. It was getting a little bit uncomfortable up there. What with all the snow, and all."

She giggled. His dry sense of humor seemed to be back.

"There may have been some other reasons, though." He admitted, looking at the sunset behind her. "I had a lot of time to think on my way down. I couldn't leave you guys behind. Even if I was technically behind bars."

"I guess we have Ethan to thank, then." Leaf muttered. The tone became somber. "I hope he knows what he's getting into."

"A long, cold stay on the Silver Mountain." Red answered darkly. "He seemed pretty okay with it, though. Literally skipped his little ass off that mountain."

Leaf giggled again, looking back into his eyes. They... changed, somehow. Before, there was always a somber tone about them. They were grayer, having a sadness lacing the iris and changing every expression. He used to speak with them, long before he'd found his voice and long before he won the league. But now, it was as if it was back to where he was back then, when the weight of the world was off of his shoulders; when Pokémon battling was for fun. They were bright. He'd gotten taller, too. Last time they saw each other she was still a good two or three inches taller than him, another thing that had once lowered his ego to the size and weight of a newborn rattata. Now, the script had been flipped.

"There's a world tournament. In Unova." Leaf's voice was quieter now, hushed. "They want the best. Gym leaders and champions and such from all over. Blue's already going, but he's not the best trainer from Kanto. I stole his two tickets... he'll have to get another one, because I'm not going with him."

He chuckled. She was still the same old Leaf.

"Oh..." She sighed, "I'm sure he's gonna wanna go somewhere as compensation. Kalos, or some other island region near Hoenn... Dang, what's it called?... Alola, definitely."

Her face burned, out of character for her. She twiddled her fingers and stared at his feet. "I was wondering... if you wanted to go...? With me."

Red smiled. "Like old times? Sure. Just make sure we get different rooms this time."

"Oh, I don't know." She traced his face with her finger. Red's hands had somehow found their way to her shoulders, and his mind was screaming at him to kiss her but he was stuck staring at her collarbone instead. A bead of sweat rolled down his temple.

Leaf giggled lightly, but it eventually devolved into full-on laughter. "You know, you made it all the way down here, took the effort to find me, ran all the way out here, and this is where you get stuck?" She slowly caught a hold of his cheeks and guided his mouth to her own. He didn't fight back. She had waited years for that kiss. He didn't know it, but he had waited longer. He just realized it then.

"—Shut up."

Leaf stared right back into his near-mahogany eyes. She gave him a cocky little grin, typical of the girl he knew when they were traveling. "You get your answer to your life calling after staying up there on that mountain for so long, Champion?"

He shook his head, a stupid little smile growing on his face as he rubbed his brown hair. "No, I didn't, but I get the sense that you did."

She giggled a bit, leaning her head on his chest as he wrapped his arms around her. "I've missed you, Red."

"I know."

* * *

"Yes, I need another ticket for the tournament in Unova."

"Mr. Oak, we'd already given you two. Might I ask what happened to those tickets?"

An audible smirk, trademarked by the man holding the phone. "Let's just say... I might not be the best trainer in Kanto. There's another guy out there who holds that title."

The line was silent for a few seconds. "Do you mean... him?"

A chuckle. "Yeah. Don't tell anyone, though.

We don't want to ruin a couple's secret honeymoon, now would we?"

* * *

 **I'm sure you read the dates up top. It took me a while to get back to this. And I have some major explaining to do.**

 **I'm not coming back to fanfiction. At least, not full-time. I'm working on an original project which scale dwarfs all I've ever done. And that took attention from fanfiction. Pokémon always lives in my heart, but this story will likely be my last for a long, long time. I'm not officially retiring... just Favre retiring. I might make a few one shots here and there.**

 **Also, high school is hard. Even if you're smart. If you're struggling, know you're not alone. Teachers are there to help you—and they will help you.**

 **Seeing as though I'm holding this as my "retirement fic", I'll go ahead and get this out of the way. I have many people to thank for getting me into writing in the first place. This site gave me the initiative to start writing on my own, back when I was still making crappy 200-word chapters of Gravity Falls stories. So with that, I have to give credit where it's due. Some names might not ring a bell, as I've seen authors come and go in my time between five years here. To Advanced Faith, TheShinyGengar (Blue is the New Red), Darkslash9, SuperGroverAway, stalrua, Skitty13, wubbzy, CrystalClearCourier, johnny3gud, and every one of the Advancers who even made an Advanceshipping fic, SomewhereInNevada and all the BurningLeafShippers, to those readers who read unfinished work and wanted an ending they never got (I apologize sincerely.), Fawn, wherever you are, and my cousin for giving me my first video game; a small cartridge of Pokémon FireRed—thank you. You each junpstarted a passion that stretched far from fanfiction into something I'll devote my life to.**

 **Gotta catch 'em all—never stop trying to catch them all.**

 **Dal**


End file.
